Game Information
#9 Illinois Fighting Illini (3-0) at #19 Indiana Hoosiers (3-0)
Time: 6:30pm CT Saturday
How to watch: NBC
DraftKings Odds
Spread: Indiana -6.5
Total: 52.5
It’ll be a battle of top 20 teams on Saturday night when the #9 Illinois Fighting Illini travel to Bloomington to go up against the #19 Indiana Hoosiers in a huge Big Ten matchup with College Football Playoff implications.
With Illinois being the higher ranked team and with both teams appearing pretty even, the spread of Indiana -6.5 seems a few points higher than it should be.
Home field advantage in football is typically worth about 3 to 3.5 points, so a line of Indiana -6.5 suggests the Hoosiers would be favored by about a field goal on a neutral field and the spread would be about a pick ‘em if this game was played in Champaign.
That doesn’t seem right to me.
If this was a home game for the top 10 Illini, I would not expect them to be listed as a pick ‘em; rather, I think they’d be a favorite by about a field goal.
And if you agree with me on that, then it would make sense for Indiana to be about -3 on Saturday instead of -6.5 - meaning I think we are getting a few points of value on the Illini to cover.
In the one game we saw Illinois play a team with a pulse, they went on the road to Duke and put up 45 points while smashing the Blue Devils by 26.
Indiana has played one game against a decent opponent in Old Dominion, and the Hoosiers scored 27 points and only won by 13 at home.
It’s a small sample size, but Illinois has proven more against decent competition and doesn’t deserve to be this big of an underdog.
Illinois has been a covering machine so far with a perfect 3-0 record against the spread. This game could go either way straight up, so I recommend grabbing the 6.5 points with the Illini.
Lean: Illinois +6.5 at -108 on DraftKings
Eric Sontag hosts Domesticated Gamblers every Wednesday night on the STL Sports Central YouTube channel. Follow him on X @GamblingDads, and click here for his daily picks on all of our St. Louis area sports teams. Picks = betting the game - minus odds betting to win 1 unit, plus odds risking 1 unit. Leans = no strong opinion, not betting the game. Disclaimer